The Saints have gone from underdogs to favorites vs. the Eagles next week after Philadelphia lost a heartbreaker on Monday night.
New Orleans had opened up on Sunday night as roughly +120 underdogs at home vs. the Eagles — a line that would've been priced even longer just two weeks ago.
After the Eagles crumbled on an inexplicable series of events during the last two minutes vs. the Falcons on Monday night, their odds for their following game tanked correspondingly.
The Eagles went from a market-best of around -125 on Monday afternoon to +130 less than 24 hours later. That line can be found at Caesars. The Saints' ML, of course, went the inverse direction, falling to its Wednesday-best at -142, a price that can be found at DraftKings.
On the spread, the Eagles fell from -3 favorites to their current mark of about +2.5 to +3. The best market price as of Wednesday afternoon is at BetMGM, where you can get the Eagles at +3 (-115).
For the Saints, the best price on Tuesday (-2.5, -115 at Fanatics) pales in comparison to Monday, when you could find some +3s hanging out throughout the market. That price remains the same on Wednesday.
Nothing elementally changed, of course. Sharp action on the Saints can be to blame, yes, but the market reacts on recency bias, too. Had the Eagles closed out their win vs. the Falcons — as they should've — this line movement would not have been as drastic.
But, again, nothing has elementally changed. Philadelphia is still well regarded offensively, and it'll gather a better understanding about how to move the ball without A.J. Brown, who was injured just three days prior to Eagles vs. Falcons.
The Saints are moderate analytics darlings at the moment, leading the league in overall DVOA (defense-adjusted value over average) and EPA/play. Derek Carr, for crying out loud, leads the NFL in EPA/play + CPOE (completion percentage over expected), the single-best predictive measure for the NFL MVP race.
For reference, Bills quarterback Josh Allen ranks No. 2 on that list while Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes clocks in at No. 9. The two — widely considered the best quarterbacks in the NFL — are the two favorites to win MVP, too.
Of course, these stats are all over an incredibly small sample size. The Saints played the Panthers in Week 1, inflating both their offensive and defensive metrics.
But a win over the highly-touted Cowboys on Sunday — an absolute blowout — solidified their standing in the market among retail to go along with data nerds.
And while the advanced metrics backup the eye test, it's far too soon to make wide-sweeping extrapolations over a tiny set of data. Yet, the market still reacted accordingly to recent performances.
